Holly Manthei, Trevor Laws, Scott Larson among 12 inductees The newest Minnesota State High School League Hall of Fame induction class includes a three-sport state champion from Burnsville High School, a dominant wrestler and football player from Apple Valley High School, and a longtime teacher, coach and administrator from District 196. Holly Manthei, Trevor Laws and Scott Larson took their places in the MSHSL Hall of Fame during a ceremony...

Joe Baldus throws no-hitter in victory over Burnsville Other coaches might shy away from comparing their current teams with the best teams they’ve ever worked with, but not Farmington’s Jon Graff. The Tiger baseball team’s 4-0 start is evoking comparisons to Farmington’s 2021 state Class 4A champions and 2022 runners-up. Some of them are coming from Graff, the head coach. ...

Cougars’ Vukovics, Flicek win two events each Two of the top Class 3A girls track and field teams in Minnesota took on the undisputed standard-bearer in North Dakota at an April 12 meet at Rosemount High School. Rosemount traditionally invites North Dakota teams to one of its early-season meets. Answering the challenge this year were the girls and boys squads from Fargo Davies High School. The Davies girls have been...

St. Paul chapter banquet is April 17 Local high schools’ top senior female athletes will be honored at Athena Awards banquets in St. Paul and Minneapolis. The St. Paul event is 10:30 a.m. Wednesday, April 17, at the RiverCentre. Students from Apple Valley, Eagan, Eastview, Farmington, Lakeville North, Lakeville South and Trinity at River Ridge high schools will be among the athletes recognized. ...

Final match of college wrestling career is national title victory A wrestler looking for a path to success could do a lot worse than the Apple Valley-Augsburg track. Apple Valley has won a state-record 25 high school team championships. Augsburg University has 15 NCAA Division III championships, the most recent coming last month. The Auggies are tied with Wartburg College for the most Division III titles in history. ...

Lakeville South wins pitchers’ dual against Rosemount Typically, early season high school baseball games go one of two ways. Sometimes the scoreboard is filled with crooked numbers because of a blizzard of walks and errors as teams try to knock off the rust. The other possibility is a low-scoring game as hitters try to catch up to the pitchers. That’s what was on display Monday as Lakeville South defeated Rosemount...

Harry Sonie directs Breck to Class 2A boys basketball title Breck’s victory in the state Class 2A boys basketball championship game March 23 was a first for the school, but not for some of the Mustangs’ coaches. Head coach Harry Sonie had been there before, just not as a coach. When Breck defeated Lake City 76-72 in the title game, Sonie said it seemed as if the circle was complete....

Four local basketball players are among the 40 selected for the Minnesota Girls High School All-Star Series to be held Saturday, April 6, at Carleton College in Northfield. Players chosen from the Sun Thisweek and Dakota County Tribune coverage area are Trinity Wilson and Gabby Betton, both of Lakeville North, Finley Ohnstad of Lakeville South and Avery Moeller of Rosemount. Wilson and Betton led Lakeville North to the South Suburban...

SSC baseball, softball openers scheduled Monday A year ago, the remnants of an unusually harsh winter prevented many high school spring sports teams from starting their seasons on schedule. Some were forced to be flexible, such as softball teams playing games that counted inside domes or improvised fields or artificial turf. This year, a historically...

Cougars sweep varsity, JV team titles Lakeville South continued its domination of Minnesota state high school weightlifting, sweeping the team championships and winning nine individual titles at the state meet March 9 in Cannon Falls. The Cougars scored 42 points to win their fifth consecutive varsity team championship. Northfield and Cannon Falls finished second and third. In the JV division, South won its sixth straight championship with 54 points. Cannon...

AVHS graduate Kim wins Division III wrestling title Former South Suburban Conference athletes were key contributors to teams that recently won NCAA Division III championships in wrestling and women’s hockey. Augsburg University won its 15th Division III wrestling title, tying an NCAA record, in the national tournament that concluded March 16 in La Crosse, Wisconsin. The Auggies got a huge boost from Apple Valley High School graduate Tyler Kim, the...

Wildcats finish third in Class 4A boys tourney In the late 2010s, after the latest in a string of losing records for the boys varsity team, Eagan High School basketball decided it had enough. The program could remain mired in mediocrity, or it could do the things that brought success to some of the Wildcats’ rival schools in Class 4A. ...

After finally reaching state, boys basketball team set up for long-term success Fans have grown used to seeing South Suburban Conference teams at the state boys basketball tournament. Just not the two that went this year. Eagan had not been to the tournament in 19 years, making its last appearance in 2005, before the SSC...

Farmington defeats Lakeville North in section boys final, ending 87-year drought Quick, name something that happened between the Great Depression and World War II. There are any number of correct answers, one of which is that it was the time of Farmington High School’s only appearance in the state high school boys basketball tournament – until this week. The Class 4A field again has several schools that regularly show up...

Rosemount finishes sixth at state girls basketball “It’s not how you start but how you finish” is a well-known, well-worn axiom. Rosemount, however, proved that how you start still matters. Turnovers on their first six possessions put the Irish in a hole they spent the rest of the game trying to escape in the Class 4A girls basketball quarterfinals. A 68-57 loss to defending state champion St. Michael-Albertville on March...

North recovers quickly from last-second loss at state A last-second loss in the state girls basketball quarterfinals put Lakeville North in a place the Panthers had seen too many times before and didn’t want to be in again. Nothing against the Gangelhoff Center and Concordia University in St. Paul, but the Panthers already know their way around the place. In five of the last six years they have headed over...

Eagan puts on dominant performance against Eastview in section boys basketball final Max Buslee called the public perception of Eagan’s boys basketball program “a label on our back.” And it might as well have weighed a ton. The knock on the Wildcats was they didn’t need to be taken seriously once the playoffs started. Maybe...

Maple Grove buzzer-beater sinks Panthers One couldn’t overcome a rough start. The other suffered through about the most deflating ending imaginable. So it went for two South Suburban Conference teams on the first day of the state girls basketball tournament. Rosemount fell behind defending Class 4A champion St. Michael-Albertville early, then made several runs at...

Getting past first round at state is major point of emphasis Lakeville North is playing in the state girls basketball tournament for the 12th time in 15 years, but the Panthers have had too many early exits for their liking. The last time North won a Class 4A quarterfinal was 2018, when they edged Maple Grove 68-66. The Panthers lost in the semifinals to an Eastview team that went on...

Eastview, with 6-22 record, returns to section final Is it even possible for a No. 1 section seed to be an underdog at home against a 6-22 team? Eagan boys basketball coach Kevin McKenzie, whose team is the aforementioned No. 1 seed, knows that idea is a tough sell. But he’s going with it anyway. “We tend to play better when we have an underdog mentality,” he said. ...